Phosphate fertilizer



NOV. 9 w. D. BANCROFT ET AL 2,222,736

PHOSPHATE FERTILIZER Filed oct. 21, 1938 ALIPHHTIC Dmmmss sum as PHOSPHQTICHGTEBIGL sum as Dncmuun- Ewnmsmnmus nuvDmnmolsoPeoPnnoL TxalceLuum- HZON- flaenzssuw RNQ/OB mum-Nun PHbSPHBTl-Z l L 'Gr'md'mq the Phosphate I Application. to Soil I moms: m flvmmsu: Gamma Dm-uswu PHosPHoeus as a 0F Puos uoaus PLANT NUTlEiENT wmaouen THE Sou.

eupmmc Dmmmss Suorl As PHosPHmcHaTEzmLsucHes Dmmcwm- ETHYLENEDIHMINE HNDDIHMINMSOPBOPHNOL TBICALCIUM- IIZON- NAGNESIUH- euo/orz ALUMINUM PHOSPHATE Application to Salt Immense m AvmmaL: GREATER. DIFFuswN PHOSPHORUS as 6 OF PHosPHoraus DLBNT NUTRH-INT THROUGH THE Sou.

L P f76.5

AuPHPmc. Dmnmzs sucH AS ETHYLENEDIAWNE mm D\Hr1\NOISOP20PfiNOL GPPl'LcaHon to 501]. Containing \nsolu bla Pnospmtic MaterLaL such, asTncaLc'Lum Phosphake \Ncreinsi 1N PNHILHBLE GREATER Dun-9510M h/lwie flfliA/FBWT PHo'sPHoeus as a OF PHOSPHOEUS fi/V/ISW PLeN NUTE\ENT maoueu THE Sou Jai/vffiurzzzzw Patented Nov. 26, 1940 PATENT OFFICE PHO SPHATE FERTILIZER Wilder D. Bancroft, James K. Wilson, and John E. Rutzler, Jr., Ithaca, N. Y.

Application October 21, 1938, Serial No. 236,342

6 Claims.

tion-in-part of application Serial No. 113,254,

filed November 28, 1936.

Phosphatic materials, such as ordinary tricalcium phosphate, contain phosphorus which is a valuable plant nutrient; but under ordinary conditions the phosphorus in tricalcium phosphate is not highly available to plants. This lack of availability of the phosphorus in ordinary phosphate rock, tricalcium phosphate, Thomas slag, guano and other phosphatic materials which contain appreciable percentages of phosphorus in only a slightly available form, has made necessary the acid treatment whereby rock phosphate is converted by a strong acid, such as sulfuric acid, to forms which are much more available to plants. Such processes broadly speaking produce either the water-soluble form, such as monocalcium phosphate, or the slightly watersoluble form dicalcium phosphate, which is somewhat available to plants and is ordinarily designated as citrate soluble.

It is an object of our invention to make available the phosphorus in tricalcium phosphate or other insoluble phosphatic materials such as phosphate rock, guano, Thomas slag, calcium metaphosphate, ferric, aluminum, calcium and magnesium phosphates and the like, Without treating these materials by expensive processes and without subjecting them to chemical decomposition.

Further objects of our invention are to provide a fertilizer the phosphorus in which becomes available to plants after application to the soil and which will retain its availability for a considerable length of time. The phosphorus in our fertilizer materials will be found in an available form over a considerable range of depth in the soil compared, for example, to the phosphorus in phosphate rock alone.

With these and other objects in view, which will be readily apparent from the ensuing description, our invention comprises the steps hereinafter set forth and the products resulting from the steps enumerated.

We have found that when certain amines are applied to soil which contains residual, unavailable compounds of phosphorus large increases in plant growth result. For example, when ethylenediamine is applied either to a Dunkirk soil which has been phosphated in past years or to a Dunkirk soil in conjunction with a phosphatic material such as phosphate rock in which the phosphorus is of a low degree of availability, commercially important increases in yields of tomatoes, soy beans and pasture grasses are obtained. Also by way of example, diaminoisopropanol under similar conditions produces commercially important increases in yields of tomatoes in Ontario soil, barley in Dunkirk and Minatare soils and potatoes in Volusia soil. Without the presence of the amine under such circumstances the yields were found to be considerably less. Other amines, such as propylenediamine and 1,3-diamino-2-methyl-propanol-2 for example, also give excellent increases in yields of fruits and grains when applied to soils containing unavailable phosphorus or when applied I to the soil in conjunction with substantially insoluble phosphatic materials. So far as we have been able to determine, there is no direct chemical reaction between our amines and the insoluble phosphatic materials which we prefer to use therewith. Our invention is useful in many and diverse types of soils as is shown by the fact that large increases in yields have been obtained when amines were applied to as widely different types of soils as Dunkirk, Ontario, Sassafras, Minatare and Volusia' soils, for example. A variety of plants have been found to give large increases in yields when one of our amines is applied to such soils in presence of substantially insoluble, unavailable phosphatic materials; by way of examples we may cite the following: tomatoes, rutabagas, white mustard, buckwheat, barley, soy beans, millet, peas, pasture grasses, beets, oats, and wheat. It will be seen from this enumeration that leguminous as well as non-leguminous plants and fruits, grains, root crops and grasses all have been found to respond to the practice of our invention.

A new, novel and unexpected result of the application of our amines to the soil, along with insoluble phosphatic materials, or to soil containing unavailable phosphorus, is that it causes the phosphorus in said phosphatic materials to become available to plants. Ordinarily it would be expected that addition of amines to the soil would result in increased plant growth which could be accounted for wholly on the basis of the nitrogen added in the form of the amine. Quite unexpectedly, we have found that this is not the case. When a fertilizer such as urea is applied to the soil, the increase in plant growth which results is due largely to the nitrogen which is thereby supplied to the growing plants. Amines such as We prefer to employ in the practice of our invention function in part to supply nitrogen to the growing plant. We have found, however, that a much more important effect of these compounds is their action in and on the soil whereby unavailable phosphorus is released for use by the growing plant in amounts far in excess, as judged by the amount of increased growth obtained, of the amount of phosphorus that becomes available when the common nitrogen fertilizers such as calclum cyanamide, am-

monium sulphate, dried proteins, sodium. nitrate or urea, for example, are applied to the soil. Amines such as we employ surprisingly do not act as good nitrogen fertilizers compared to the ordinary nitrogenous fertilizers on the basis of equal amounts of nitrogen, except when there are large amounts of available phosphorus in the soil prior to the application of the amine.

In order for our amines to function well to increase the growth of plants by virtue of an action in the soil whereby the availability of unavailable phosphatic compounds and complexes is increased, we find that it often is advantageous to add phosphatic materials to the soil concurrently with the amines. This is particularly the case in soils having very small supplies of'insoluble, unavailable phosphates and in soils which have never been phosphated. On the other hand,

when a given soil contains from moderate to large amounts of residual, non-available phosphorus, we may prefer to apply our amines directly and without the addition of more phosphorus.

In the course of reducing our invention to practice, we have found that the particular form in which the substantially insoluble unavailable phosphatic material occurs is not of controlling importance. Thus, the amines that we prefer to use have the unsuspected property of increasing the availability of the phosphorus in a wide range of such phosphatic materials as, for example, tricalcium phosphate, rock phosphate, Thomas slag, guano, ferric phosphate, aluminum phosphate, magnesium phosphate, reverted superphosphate and other similar materials. Ethylenediamine; 1,3-diaminoisopropanol and methyl, ethyl and other derivatives thereof; propylenediamine and methyl, ethyl and other derivatives thereof; 1,3-diamino-2-methyl -propanol-2, various mixtures thereof as well as in many cases the crude reaction mixture containing the free base which results when they are prepared and before they are highly purified increase the availability of the unavailable phosphorus in substantially insoluble phosphatic materials either when applied to the soil alone or when applied to the soil in admixture with said substantially insoluble phosphatic materials.

7 When our fertilizer compositions are applied to the soil, or are made in the soil as the case may be, a portion of the unavailable phosphorus in the phosphatic materials becomes solubilized so that it is more available for plant growth. While the exact mechanism of this action is not clear to us, it appears to be a fact that a part of the solubilized phosphorus diffuses in the soil solution so that available phosphorus is to be found over a greater portion of the soil profile than would be the case in the absence of the amine.

That the increased availability of phosphorus brought about by our amines is not a transitory efiect is shown by the fact that upon growing a second crop, a year later, on land treated as in the examples of the practice of our invention which are given, excellent increases in pliant growth are obtained. Thus one treatment results in two years increase in plant growth of a degree that cannot be explained on the basis of either the amount of phosphorus or the amount of nitrogen added in carrying out the invention.

We have found that aliphatic diamines of various kinds such as have been given by way of example, mixtures thereof as well as the crude reaction products containing the free bases which can be obtained during their manufacture prior plant either more efflciently or in larger amounts to final purification, have this new, novel and useful property of increasing the availability of the phosphorus in substantially insoluble phosphatic materials. It is these aliphatic diamines that we prefer to use in the practice of our in- 5 vention. The only difference in claimed subject matter between our co-pending application Serial No. 235,668, filed October 18, 1938 and the present application is that the former relates to amines which can be classed as alkanolamines while the present application relates only to amines which can be classed as aliphatic diamines. It is intended that these shall be two distinct classes of amines.

These amines all have another characteristic l5 property which, for some reason which is not clearly understood, marks them as useful in the practice of our invention and distinguishes them from other amines and similar compounds which do not markedly increase the availability of the phosphorus in insoluble phosphatic materials. We have found that all of these. aliphatic diamines which increase the availability of phosphorus to growing plants possess the property of peptizing tricalcium phosphate, or finely ground phosphate 'rock, in aqueous dispersion media ,in which there are substantially no 00- agulating cations such as calcium, magnesium and iron, for example, or in aqueous dispersion media in which the concentration of monovalent cations is low. This property distinguishes our amines from compounds such as, for example, aniline, pyridine and urea which. do not appreciably peptize tricalcium phosphate, or finely ground phosphate rock, in aqueous dispersion media and also do not act in the soil to markedly increase the availability to growing plants of the phosphorus present in the soil in'substantially unavailable forms.

' Examples of procedures which will accomplish the desired result oi making the phosphorus in substantially insoluble phosphates, or phosphatic materials, available for plant growth will now be given. These examples are by way of illustration only, it being clearly understood that there are 4,; many equivalent methods which will be obvious to those skilled in the art once the details oi the practice of our invention are disclosed.

Example i 50 This is an example of compositions comprising an insoluble phosphatic material and one or more aliphatic diamines which when applied to the soil furnish available phosphorus to the growing than if the insoluble phosphatic material were applied alone. Example I of the practice of our invention is shown diagrammatically in Figure 1. As suitable amines we may employ, for example, 1,3-diaminoisopropanol, ethylenediamine, 1,3-diamino-Z-methyl-propanol 2, propylenediamine and/or 'methyl, ethyl and other derivatives of these and other aliphatic diamines. We may employ mixtures of these aliphatic diamines or mixtures of these diamines and other aliphatic diamines. Alternatively, we may prefer to employ impure reaction products in the form of the free bases formed during the manufacture of allphatic diamines. The three criteria by which it is possible to determine whether or not a given amine falls within the scope of this invention are: First, it shall be an aliphatic diamine; Second, it shall peptize tricalcium phosphate in aqueous solution as already set forth; And third, it shall increase the availability to growing plants of the unavailable or slightly available phosphorus in, for example, rock phosphate of asuificient degree of fineness. This invention is to be construed as covering all amines that meet these three tests. As insoluble phcsphatic material we may employ, for example, tricalcium phosphate, dicalcium phosphate, iron phosphate, magnesium phosphate or aluminum phosphate. Or we may employ a mixture of these phosphates in a fairly pure form or in the form of phosphate rock of a high or inferior grade as judged by the standards of the day. Thomas slag, guano and other phosphatic materials, such as insoluble metaphosphates, may be used. The choice of insoluble phosphatic material to be used in our compositions may be varied over a very wide range, as will be apparent to those skilled in the art. While. on the other hand it is of very great importance to employ the proper kind of aliphatic diamine.

It is only necessary to grind the phosphatic material to a'fairly fine state of subdivision, so that it will pass through a 200-mesh sieve for instance. Clearly, many of the ordinary industrial grinding methods will serve for this purpose. The more finely divided the material is, the more efiiciently will it serve to supply available phosphorus to plants and the more effective will the amine be in increasing the availability of the phosphorus therein when the composition is incorporated with the soil. From our experiments, there does not appear to be any critical particle size of the insoluble phosphatic material above which or below which the amine fails entirely to function to produce a composition which when applied to the land will supply a greater than normal amount of available phosphorus for growing plants. On the other hand, the size of the particles of the insoluble phosphatic material 40 influences the amount of amine that can be in- Ways.

corporated therewith to produce a composition having acceptable mechanical properties for easy, uniform distribution over the land. The smaller the size of the particles the greater, within limits, is the amount of amine that can be incorporated with a given amount of a specific phosphatic material.

The amine may be incorporated with the insoluble phosphatic material in any one of several For instance, the desired amount of the amine may be intimately mixed with the phosphatic material during the latter part of the dry grinding operation upon said phosphatic material provided means are employed to prevent volatilization and/or decomposition of the amine by the heat generated during said grinding. Or, the grindin may be carried out in water cooled apparatus to prevent volatilization and/or decomposition. If wet grinding is employed, the liquid used may be a water solution of the amine.

Alternatively, the phosphatic material may be mixed after being ground and while in a dry condition with the desired quantity of the desired aliphatic diamine. There are numerous wellknown methods for accomplishing this.

Again, We may prefer to mix finely ground phosphatic material with a solution of the amine. This may be done in several ways which are familiar to those skilled in the art, using as solvent for the amine either water or organic liquids. Furthermore, the amine may be incorporated with the phosphatic material at any one of several times. For instance, they may be mixed either during or immediately after grinding, or when bagging the phosphatic material for sale,

or by atomizing the amine or a solution thereof into the phosphatic material at some stage 01' its handling on the farm.

A number of compositions which when applied to the land will accomplish the desired result of making the phosphorus in substantially insoluble phosphatic materials more available "to plants than it would be in absence of the amine will now be given. It is to be understood that these compositions are merely by way of example and that other, equivalent compositions will accomplish the desired results as well as combinations of the compositions given.

- Pounds Phosphate rock 1000 Ethylenediamine 90 2 Phosphate rock 1000 Diaminoisopropanol 100 3 Phosphate rock 1000 Ethylenediamine 60 4 Phosphate rocl 1000 Limestone 1000 Ethylenediamine 175 5 Phosphate rock 1000 Diaminoisopropanol 35 Ethylenediamine 40 Tetramethyldiaminoisopropanol 15 Phosphate rock 1000 Limestone 1000 Diaminoisopropanol 75 Ethylenediamine 75 Tetramethyldiaminoisopropanol 30 7 Phosphate rock "1000 Ethylenediamine 60 1,3-diamino-2-methyl-propanol-2 15 Propylenediamine 15 8 Phosphate rock 1000 Potassium chloride 200 Sodium nitrate 400 Diaminoisopropanol 40 Ethylenediamine 50 Propylenediamine 9 Thomas slag 2000 Ethylenediamine 130 Diaminoisopropanol 50 10 Guano 2000 Diaminoisopropanol 175 11 Ferric phosphate, 1000 Ethylenediamine 60 Propylenediamine 20 12 Tricalcium phosphate 1000 Diaminoisopropanol 80 13 Thomas slag 2000 Crude ethylenediamine 225 14 Phosphate rock 000 Crude diaminoisopropanol 90 In general, the compositions given are sufficient in amount to treat approximately two acres of land. However, this Will vary widely depending upon the fertilizer requirements of the land to which these compositions are applied.

The compositions given by way of example of the practice of our invention illustrate :a few of the variations which are to be construed as covered by said invention. For instance, compositions 1, 2, 5, and 7 illustrate the use of different amines; while compositions 5, 6, '7, 8, 9, and 11 illustrate the use of mixtures of amines. Various proportions of amine to insoluble phosphatic material are shown in compositions 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, and 12; while mixture number 6 shows how other fertilizer material can be incorporated with the insoluble phosphatic material and the amine so that the amount of the amine compared to the amount of phosphatic material can be increased without producing a too sticky and lumpy composition for efficient, easy distribution over the land. Composition 8 il lustrates the use of an amine and an insoluble phosphatic material in a complete fertilizer mixture. Compositions l, 9, 10, 11, and 12 illustrate the use of a variety of phosphatic materials in our fertilizer mixtures. In the case of compositions 13 and 14; the principle of using.

the crude products of the reaction by which the amines are made is illustrated.

The proportion of amine to insoluble phosphatic material can be varied over a Wide range, although for the most effective practice of our invention we have found that the proportion should be so adjusted that when the composition is applied to the land from to 190 pounds of the amine will be applied to each acre thereof. However, it should be understood that greater and lesser amounts of amine than these also will function to give larger increases in plant growth than would be obtained from the phosphatic material alone or the phosphatic material plus an amount of nitrogen equivalent to that present in the amine. Therefore, our invention is not limited to any specific range of amounts of amines.

Example II Instead of mixing an insoluble phosphatic ma terial with an aliphatic diamine and applying the mixture to the soil, We may prefer to make the mixture in the soil. For this purpose a finely ground, 200 mesh, for example, phosphatic material either of high or low grade is app-lied to the soil at the rate of from 100 to 2000 pounds per acre. A suitable aliphatic diamine or a combination of suitable aliphatic diamines, such as will peptize tricalcium phosphate in aqueous solution in absence of too high a concentration of metallic, coagulating cations, is then applied to the soil. This example of our invention is shown diagrammatically in- Figure 2. In applying the amine we find that it is preferable to make a water solution thereof of a concentration of less than fifty percent and apply said solution to the land in order to ensure a uniform distribution over the land. Either higher or lower concentrations of amine can be employed in the preparation of a mixture suitable for application to the soil; the pure amine may be placed on the soil if desired, However, when the amine is applied at a time when the crop is in the soil to be treated, much less concentrated solutions than fifty percent must be employed in order to avoid a toxic effect on the plants, or else special precautions should be taken to avoid contact between plant and amine. In general, solutions of a strength of less than ten percent of amine are employed by preference when there is a growing crop in the ground.

For the purpose of carrying out this form of our invention we prefer to employ not less than ten pounds of amine per acre of land and not as much as will be toxic to the plant which is to be grown on the soil. The order of application of the phosphatic material and the amine may be reversed if desired. Alternatively, we find it desirable to make a solution of a soluble fertilizer material suchas potassium nitrate, by way of example, and add to such solution the proper amountof a suitable amine and apply the whole to the soil.

Example III Since many soils contain natively an abundance of substantially insoluble and unavailable phosphatic materials, We prefer in many such cases to apply one or more of our aliphatic diamines ora mixture thereof to the soil in the manner and at the rate indicated in Example II, without firstor subsequently applying any phosphatic material whatever. Also, many soils contain quite large supplies of substantially insoluble phosphatic materials resulting from the reversion and fixation of phosphorus fertilizers which have been applied thereto previously. Such soils as these benefit markedly from the application of our amines or mixtures thereof without further application of phosphorus.

On such soils as these we prefer to apply from ten to five hundred pounds per acre of our allphatic diamines. By way of example, one hundred pounds per acre of diaminoisopropanol gave approximately 120% increase in yield of tomatoes when applied to Ontario silty clay loam which had been heavily phosphated with superphosphate for about six years prior to the application of the amine; while twelve hundred pounds per acre of 4-12-4 fertilizer containing superphosphate gave a considerably smaller increase in yield.

We have found in soils such as these that it is only necessary to incorporate the amine with the soil in any of the ways indicated in Example II toachieve the results of increased phosphorus availability and increased plant growth. Alternatively to broadcasting the amine or an aqueous solution thereof over the land, we may prefer to apply the amine or its solution in rows beside the planted seeds or growing plants as the case may be. iii/hen this procedure is adopted, we have found that a smaller total quantity of our amines is required to produce the maximum amount of increased growth.

It will be seen readily by those skilled in the art that this example of the practice of our invention is merely a variant of Example I in that in the present example the mixture of phospnatic material and amine is formed in thesoil rather than being preformed and then added to the soil as in Example I. Example III of the practice of our invention is shown diagrammatically in Figure 3.

While we have described the preferred embodiment of our invention, we wish it to be understood that we do not confine ourselves to the precise details herein. set forth by way of illustration, as it is apparent that many changes and variations may be made therein, by those skilled in the art, without departing from the spirit of the invention or exceeding the scope of the appended claims.

till

We claim:

1. A new fertilizer composition comprising a finely divided and substantially insoluble phosphatic material and an aliphatic diamine in peptizing proportions of the class consisting of ethylenediamine, diaminoisopropanol and propylenediamine.

2. A new fertilizer composition comprising a finely divided and substantially insoluble phosphatic material and ethylenediamine, said amine being present in peptizing proportions.

3. A new fertilizer composition comprising a finely divided and substantially insoluble phosphatic material and ethylenediamine, the weight of said amine amounting to from 5 to 9 per cent of the weight of the phosphatic material in the said composition.

4. A new fertilizer composition comprising a finely divided and substantially insoluble phosphatic material and diaminoisopropanol, said amine being present in peptizing proportions.

5. A new fertilizer composition comprising a finely divided and substantially insoluble phosphatic material and diaminoisopropanol, the weight of said amine amounting to approximately 9 per cent of the weight of the phosphatic material in the said composition.

6. A new fertilizer composition comprising a finely divided and substantially insoluble phosphatic material and Dropylenediamine, said amine being present in peptizing proportions.

WILDER D. BANCRDFT. JAMES K. WILSON. JOHN E. RUTZLER', JR. 

